“Are you sure that collar is real?”
“It was when I paid for it.”
“Admit it, you miss the thrill of it.” She nudged the father with her shoulder.
“You got me. Once the life of crime gets a hold of you, you’re hooked. It was just this morning that I was eyeing Hector’s lunchbox on the table and contemplated picking the lock just to see what was inside.”
She pointed her coffee swivel stick at him. “You know, you’re funny when you want to be.”
“You mean when I’m not in danger or in the midst of committing a felony.”
Talking to Father Parker was cathartic, like a confession, at least the closest to confession that she would ever get.
“Is this it?” he asked, holding up a Barbra Streisand CD.
“No, my mom has that one.”
“So why the gift? Is it her birthday?”
“No, it’s sort of a peace offering.”
“What did you do?” he asked.
“It wasn’t me. It was my cat, Charlie. My mom has, um, had an exotic fish…”
“Spare me the gory details,” he said, chuckling.
“In Charlie’s defense, it was an ugly fish.”
“Excuse me, ma’am,” a man dressed in a T-shirt with the store’s logo interrupted. He pointed to a sign on the wall. “You can’t bring drinks on this side of the store.”
“What’s the point of having a coffee shop if you can’t drink the coffee while you shop?” she asked.
“I’m sorry, ma’am. That’s the rule,” the clerk said.
“You wouldn’t want to break the rules, now would you?” Father Parker asked.
She pointed her coffee stick at the father. “This is not over.” She put the stick in her mouth and raised her hand in defeat to the clerk. As she passed the clerk, she gestured her head toward Father Parker. “You might want to keep an eye on him. He’s a master criminal. He plots against kids’ lunchboxes.”
She made it out of the music section and turned the corner around an aisle of books but was forced to pull up short to avoid a fellow customer standing on the other side.
“Sorry about that. Didn’t see you.”
The customer nodded but didn’t raise his head from his book.
She looked at him closely. “Jeff?”
The SILC intern lifted his head to make eye contact.
“What brings you so far north on a workday?”
Jeff stared at her as though he did not understand the question.
“SILC’s on the other side of town,” she said, unsure why she had to explain the obvious.
“Oh, right. I’m not with SILC anymore. I’m interning at city hall.” Jeff closed the book and inspected the cover, and she stared at him, digesting this new information.
“So looking for some new Heart?” he asked.
“What?”
He motioned his head toward the music section. “I know how you like to listen to Heart.”
She stared at him. “How would you know that?”
“Huh?” He held the book tight to his chest.
“How would you know that I listen to Heart?”
“You played it at work,” he stated matter-of-factly.
“No, Jeff, I didn’t play it at work. I never played it at work, unless I was alone…or thought I was alone.”
He diverted his eyes and tried to swallow. It was the only answer she needed.
“Did you list ‘noose tying’ as one of your skill sets on your résumé with the mayor?”
Jeff squirmed.
“So what, the mayor offered you a cushy internship in exchange for playing a Halloween trick?” She puffed out a breath and crossed her arms.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Are you following me? Is that what he has you doing? You make one hell of an intern. Do me a favor. Tell your boss I think he’s a coward.”
Elizabeth didn’t wait for a response and turned to continue on her course. Although she was incensed that a little weasel like Jeff scared the hell out of her with such a juvenile prank, a sense of relief washed over her that Dan was cleared. She didn’t realize until then how much the thought weighed on her that Dan, a person she once trusted and admired, would have been involved in something so hurtful. No longer interested in her coffee, she tossed it into a trash can and went in search of Father Parker.
Chapter Thirty-one
“So how exactly do you know this professor, and are you sure he can be trusted?” Grace asked as she and Elizabeth approached Professor Horace Pratt’s office door.
“We sort of crossed paths when I was tracking down Geizler’s research paper. He was a research assistant on one of the academic articles that cited Geizler’s unpublished paper. He’s fluent in German and has a vested interest in helping us out.”
“A vested interest?” Grace asked.
“Long story that leads back to a cantankerous librarian.” She left it at that as she stood in front of the professor’s door and knocked. Although the professor was expecting them, she was still hoping not to stumble upon one of the professor’s lunch dates.
The professor pulled open the door just after Elizabeth knocked. “Come in,” he said and gestured toward the visitor chairs opposite his desk.
“Professor Pratt, this is Detective Grace Donovan.”
Grace reached out her hand, and the professor hastily took it. “Yes, of course, Detective.”
The professor rounded the desk and sat at the edge of his chair.
“Professor, is everything all right?” Elizabeth asked, watching the professor run his hand over the brown journal that took center stage on his desk.
“Fine, fine. Everything is fine. I just haven’t slept much since you gave me this book,” he said, caressing the book. “I’ve been sitting here for the last two hours waiting for you.”
“Okay, now you have me curious. What is it?” Grace asked.
“You know whose book this is?”
“Heinrich Geizler’s,” Elizabeth and Grace answered in unison.
The professor looked deflated as though someone stole the punch line from his joke. “You knew that?” he asked.
Elizabeth looked to Grace as though asking for permission to let the professor in on their find, and she gave a slight nod. Elizabeth clasped her hands in her lap. “We found that book in a deserted mill. Near the mill was a private school, which closed down around the same time as the mill. We believe that Geizler continued his work at the mill, somehow using the school to get the children for his research.”
“Geizler’s here?”
“Well, we’re not sure where he is now, assuming he’s still alive. The mill closed down about thirty years ago.”
“Thirty years tracks with what I found in this book, but he wouldn’t have left this behind,” the professor said.
“Why’s that?” asked Grace.
“This is Geizler’s personal journal. It dates back before World War Two when he was a student. His last entry was in 1982. There are gaps of several years where he made no entries, but it pretty much tracks his life.”
Grace gestured her hand with thinly veiled impatience when the professor stopped there. “Go on. Tell us what the journal says.”
“Much of the entries discuss his frustration at his failures. He really believed what he was doing was right. He saw his subjects as sacrifices for the greater good, that they had little to offer in life, but he was giving them a chance to offer great things to humanity by being a part of his work.”
Grace and Elizabeth sat quietly listening.
“Geizler discussed how difficult it was to find a suitable place to conduct his research. He felt most people misunderstood him and the importance of his work and expressed sincere disappointment at the academic world for failing to acknowledge him. He believed if the public could just understand his work, they would see how important it was, how important he was. Although having the opportunity to get inside his head is truly intere
sting from both a clinical and ethical point of view, what’s more fascinating is the history that this journal chronicles.”
“What do you mean?” Elizabeth asked.
“I told you this journal goes back before World War Two. We all know about the Nazi medical experiments on the Jews and others held in the camps, but he was there.”
“You mean Geizler was there?” she clarified.
“Yes, he was a medical student and then an intern, and he described firsthand some of the horrific events that took place.”
The professor opened the book and pulled out some black-and-white photos and newspaper articles and lined up the aging photographs on his desk in front of them as he spoke. “This is Dr. Klaus Schilling.” The professor pointed to a man standing in the center of three smiling men. “Dr. Schilling operated a malaria research station at Dachau’s concentration camp. There, prisoners were exposed to the disease and then injected with synthetic drugs, often in lethal doses, in an attempt to find a cure for malaria.”
He pointed to the man on the left. “This is Geizler.” Elizabeth was surprised; he appeared normal. Since learning about Geizler and his work, her mind depicted an unattractive man with grotesque features because only a monster could do something so wrong. The man in the picture appeared to be a congenial, good-looking young man, someone a person wouldn’t think twice about when passing on the street, but then again, so did Dr. Schilling.
“Looks can be deceiving. Who is this man?” she asked, pointing to the third man in the photo.
“Dr. Giovanni Rossi,” replied Professor Pratt.
Grace sat up. “Wait a minute. Rossi? Are you sure?”
“Quite sure, see here.” The professor picked up the photo and turned it over. “Here on the back, Geizler wrote who was in the photo. Giovanni Rossi. Says it right here.”
Grace turned to Elizabeth. “What’s the connection?”
“Samuel Rossi’s father,” Professor Pratt answered.
Both Grace and Elizabeth snapped their attention to the professor. “How did you know?” Elizabeth asked.
“You think I didn’t look you and the detective up after I realized whose journal I had?” He pointed to Elizabeth. “You’re defending the boy accused of murdering the first Catholic priest a few years back, and the new murder of Samuel Rossi casts doubt on his guilt.” The professor then pointed to Grace. “You’re the detective investigating Rossi’s murder as well as the police officer that arrested the boy in the first place for the first murder. I must say that seeing the two of you working together is a bit unusual.”
“Sooo, what exactly does this mean?” Grace asked Elizabeth.
Before she could offer an explanation, Professor Pratt jumped in again. “It means that Heinrich Geizler was blackmailing Samuel Rossi.”
“How do you know that?” Grace asked.
“Well, besides the obvious, Geizler says as much in his journal.” The professor picked up the journal and opened to a page that he had saved with a slip of paper. “He first goes on a long rant about the hypocrisy of the medical community and his colleagues for criticizing his work in Germany.” After flipping pages in the book, he read, “With my credibility stripped by the cowards who believe themselves to be scientists, I cannot continue my research alone. Rossi’s son is the key.” Professor Pratt looked up from the page. “His next entry in the journal explains how he tracked down Samuel Rossi and essentially blackmailed him into helping him.”
“So Samuel Rossi’s father wasn’t the simple Italian country doctor that he wanted others to believe,” Elizabeth said.
“No, definitely not,” Professor Pratt answered and trailed his finger down the page, reading to himself. “It seems Giovanni Rossi met Schilling in Italy. Dr. Schilling started his malaria vaccination experiments on inmates in psychiatric asylums there. When Schilling moved to Dachau, he persuaded Giovanni Rossi to join him.”
“And what, Geizler was holding this over Samuel Rossi’s head?” Grace asked.
“Perhaps. Klaus Schilling was convicted at the Dachau trials in Germany. He was executed in 1946 for his crimes. Before he was hung, he pleaded to have the results of his experiments published.”
“It says that there?” Elizabeth asked, pointing to the journal.
“No, that’s from my own research,” the professor replied. “What I also found interesting from my research is what I didn’t find.”
“Is that a paradox?” Grace asked.
“I went through all the German medical trials, and there was no mention of Giovanni Rossi. Somehow Rossi went under the radar. He probably slipped back into Italy and took up his country doctor profession, and no one was the wiser, except Geizler, who had this.” Professor Pratt lifted the journal for emphasis.
“I guess we know why Samuel Rossi helped Geizler. He was protecting himself from the sins of his father,” Elizabeth said, understanding the deeper meaning of the poem.
“As interesting as this all is, it doesn’t put us any closer to what we really need to know. Who the hell is torturing and killing people? It sure as hell isn’t Schilling, Geizler, or Rossi,” Grace said, with her voice elevating in volume at the end.
Professor Pratt shrunk back into his chair. “I thought it was fascinating,” he sulked.
“Don’t worry about her. She’s always cranky. We appreciate the time you have taken to help us with this.” Elizabeth started collecting the photos and newspapers that were strewn on her side of the desk and stood to collect the journal. Professor Pratt looked at it longingly.
“Must you take it?” he asked.
She looked to Grace, who had her phone in her hand and was immersed in her messages. “I’m afraid so. It’s part of the investigation, but I will see what I can do to get it back to you when this is all over.”
The professor brightened at the possibility of being reunited with the journal, and she expressed her gratitude to him once again as Grace had her phone pressed to her ear and had completely tuned them out.
“So, if you find the other book, you’ll let me know?” Professor Pratt asked hopefully when Elizabeth reached the doorway.
She turned. “The other book?” She yanked on Grace’s sleeve to get her attention.
Professor Pratt pointed to the book cradled in Elizabeth’s arms. “That’s his personal journal. There’s another book with research notes of his work. In his last entry, he wrote that he thought he found it, the synthetic vaccine that is. He had a significant breakthrough. He overcame the impediment.”
“What impediment?” Grace asked, tuning back into the conversation.
“I don’t know. He doesn’t say. You need the other book.”
“What could someone do with the research book?” Grace asked.
“You mean other than patent Geizler’s lifelong work and reap all the credit and rewards?” Professor Pratt asked.
Elizabeth rather enjoyed the professor’s feisty comeback, but held back her snicker. “If a start-up pharmaceutical company got a hold of Geizler’s research, would it be possible for it to streamline through clinical trials on a new drug?” Elizabeth asked.
“This isn’t my area, but it seems possible. The pharmaceutical giants have been working on this for decades with no success. But if a company had Geizler’s research notes, they had a big head start.”
She shook Professor Pratt’s hand. “Thank you so much. You’ve been extremely helpful.”
Elizabeth turned to Grace, who stood quietly by through the entire exchange. “Come on. Let’s go.” Grace gave her a confused look. “I’ll explain in the car,” she said over her shoulder as she walked out of the professor’s office.
Chapter Thirty-two
Elizabeth sat impatiently thumbing through the current edition of a gossip magazine. She didn’t bother reading the articles, but scanned the pictures. Don’t know him, or him, or her. She wondered if it meant she was getting old if she was out of touch with the current celebrities getting their fifteen minutes of fame.
“Ms. Campbell, Mr. Iverson will see you now,” a petite woman in a well-tailored suit announced.
She dropped the magazine on the table and quickly rose to follow the woman. As her visit was unannounced, she expected to wait, but she had been sitting for the better part of an hour.
“Ms. Campbell, it’s a pleasure to see you again. I’m sorry to have kept you waiting.” Bradley Iverson strolled across the room, hand outstretched to greet her, and she could sense the insincerity in that statement.
“Thank you for seeing me,” she said with an equally insincere smile.
Iverson gestured her to the same chair she occupied on her last visit and settled himself behind his desk, but she noticed his rigid posture.
“So what can I do for you?” No drinks were offered with this visit. It was straight to the point, which she appreciated.
“The mill, it was owned by Spiedel Trust,” she stated.
“Yes, we covered that in our last visit,” he replied with a flat tone.
“What I don’t understand is why Spiedel Trust held the mill through a series of holding companies.”
After her visit with Professor Pratt, she reviewed the notes Rich gave her on the mill, and although she thought little of it at the time, she now found the holding companies curious.
“I can’t really say,” was all Iverson said, but she wasn’t perturbed. She was only getting started.
“Correct me if I’m wrong, but holding companies, especially a series of them, are useful in keeping the ownership of a company, shall we say, less than public.”
Iverson offered no response. “So, I got to thinking, why? Why would Spiedel Trust go through such effort to bury its ownership interest in the mill?” She paused for a moment, more for dramatic effect than to wait for an answer, and no answer came, as she expected.
“I think that Pieter Spiedel knew exactly who Henry Gesler was and what he would do in that mill. As you said, your uncle was a desperate man searching for a cure. But he was also a smart businessman, so he buried his involvement in Gesler’s work through holding companies.”
“Ms. Campbell, I can’t comment on what my uncle did or didn’t know. This was a long time ago; it’s history. I suggest you move on.”
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